The recent creation of the LVCourts Blog has helped me reduce the number of media calls in half. Why is this good? Because I’m a one-man shop and a guy can get pretty cranky attempting to answer multiple phone calls between 3:15 p.m. and a 4 p.m. news deadline.
Prior to the blog, I could get as many as 20 calls in the half hour prior to the afternoon news. And the calls would keep coming until after 6 p.m., as reporters attempted to find out what had happened in the 41 courts that make up the Justice and District Courts of the Regional Justice Center.
So I’ve been concentrating on the new blog and not concentrating on Wordymouth (I’ll get back to my weekly rants soon). The blog is pointed at the media and provides them with updates on court cases and calendars, plus I’ve thrown in trivia and court news.
Journalist reviews of the new blog range from “You rock!” to “Thanks!”. I was very surprised at the media’s reaction because so far most of the reporters I work with have had a hard time figuring out how to “subscribe” to my RSS feeds, and other tools.
I chose Blogspot for this new blog because it was easy and I didn’t have to contend with the IT Nazis (lovely people in the trenches, actually) in the County IT Dept. I just created it and posted. I would have gone with WordPress but that would have required lots of paperwork and approvals!
The new blog has been up a couple of weeks and I’m told its the first public affairs blog by a government agency in Nevada (I know, whoopdididoo!). Overall, its proved to be an excellent way to reduce phone calls, post information once, and allow others to find out what’s going on at the courthouse.
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